7 Ways to Prepare for a Guided Mountain Bike Trip

July 18, 2017

So, you’ve decid­ed to plan an epic moun­tain bike hol­i­day  and escape the real world for a  lit­tle sin­gle­track ther­a­py. You’re ready to turn your phone off,  ramp up your ped­al strokes and  hit the road.  As a moun­tain bike tour com­pa­ny, we get asked sim­i­lar ques­tions before the start of each ride and  we’d love to  shine some light on how you can best pre­pare for  your next moun­tain bike adven­ture, whether it’s with us or not!  To start, let’s review some ques­tions you should ask  before you com­mit to booking…

QUESTIONS TO ASK BEFORE YOU BOOK:

WHAT’S THE MAKE-UP OF THE GROUP? 

You might be inter­est­ed in know­ing who is already booked on the ride, where they are from and  their spe­cif­ic rid­ing ability. 

HOW CAN I PREPARE FOR THE RIDE? 

If the trip includes longer dis­tances and  high­er ele­va­tion gains than what you’re used to, ask how you can pre­pare for the ride to ensure you get the most out of the experience. 

HOW FIT DO I NEED TO BE FOR THIS RIDE? 

We’ve cre­at­ed a  9‑point Skill and Fit­ness Rat­ing  Sys­tem to ensure Rid­ers are matched with an appro­pri­ate ride.  You don’t want to be con­stant­ly  wait­ing  for the rest of the group, nor do you want to be  the Rid­er at the back of the trip the entire time.  It is of utmost impor­tant to us to ensure  Rid­ers are matched with moun­tain bike adven­tures appro­pri­ate for their expe­ri­ence, skill lev­el, fit­ness lev­el, and interests. 

HOW MANY KMS DO WE RIDE EACH DAY? 

Moun­tain bike tour com­pa­nies  should be able to present a dai­ly itin­er­ary of dis­tances, ele­va­tion gain/loss and  oth­er activies you’ll be par­tic­i­pat­ing in (besides biking!).

WHAT’S YOUR CANCELLATION POLICY? 

Life can get busy and the unex­pect­ed can hap­pen. It’s impor­tant to know the com­pa­ny’s can­cel­la­tion pol­i­cy and always pur­chase  trip inter­rup­tion and can­cel­la­tion insur­ance. This will ensure your costs are cov­ered if you need to can­cel last minute due to an emer­gency.  Check out this  page we put togeth­er out­lin­ing the impor­tance of  trav­el insurance. 

Once you’ve book your spot,  you’ll want to focus on prepar­ing  for your upcom­ing adventure…

7 WAYS TO PREPARE FOR A GUIDED MOUNTAIN BIKE TRIP

1. REVIEW THE ITINERARY AND RIDE DATA

It’s impor­tant to ful­ly under­stand the itin­er­ary and review  the ride data for your trip so you can pre­pare men­tal­ly and phys­i­cal­ly for the jour­ney ahead.  Remem­ber that moun­tain bik­ing 25km/day  might sound easy, but if you’re not used  big gains in ele­va­tion, you’ll want to account  for the extra work you’ll be putting in for those big climbs. 

2. CHECK YOUR PASSPORT, VISAS AND PURCHASE TRAVEL INSURANCE 

Most coun­tries require your pass­port to be valid at least six months aftet your depar­ture date. If you’ve booked your guid­ed moun­tain bike hol­i­day a year in advance, keep note if you’ll need to renew your pass­port  in time for your depar­ture date.  Depend­ing on what coun­try you’re trav­el­ing from, you may be required to pur­chase a trav­eller’s VISA pri­or to enter­ing  your des­ti­na­tion.  For exam­ple, when trav­el­ing to Nepal you need to pur­chase a  Tourist Visa  at the air­port  and the cost will vary depend­ing on your length of stay. 

As men­tioned pre­vi­ous­ly, I can’t express the impor­tance of pur­chas­ing trav­el insur­ance.  I know,  your eyes have glazed over — who wants to talk about insur­ance!  In the end, spend­ing $150  on a trav­el insur­ance pol­i­cy could mean sav­ing $10,000  if you need to can­cel your trip or if you get injured and need to be evacuated.

 We strong­ly rec­om­mend that for any trip (moun­tain bik­ing relat­ed or not), that you  obtain  the fol­low­ing coverage: 

• Trip can­cel­la­tion up to 100% of your trip cost
• Equip­ment pro­tec­tion for delay, loss, theft and dam­age (if trav­el­ing with your bike/expensive equip­ment). This can be cov­ered through renter’s or home insur­ance. Check your policy.
• Trip inter­rup­tion up to 100% of trip cost
• Med­ical expens­es up to $50,000
• Emer­gency med­ical trans­porta­tion up to $1,000,000

3. REVIEW THE WEATHER AND PACKING LIST 

Under­stand the des­ti­na­tion’s cli­mate  when you’ll be vis­it­ing and  put togeth­er a gen­er­al pack­ing list based on your indi­vid­ual needs.  Here is a gen­er­al pack­ing list the we’ve put togeth­er , which can be used as a help­ful start­ing point! 

ON THE BIKE:

• jer­sey tops
• cycling shorts with a qual­i­ty chamois (padding)
• bike gloves with padding under the palm
• cycling socks (syn­thet­ic or light­weight wool)
• arm warm­ers
• leg warm­ers
• hel­met
• cycling shoes
• ener­gy bars and electrolytes

ON AND OFF THE BIKE:

• rain jack­et (Gor­tex with pit-zips)
• wind jack­et (light­weight and form fitting)
• sweater (fleece and form fit­ting mid layer)
• top and bot­tom base lay­er (syn­thet­ic or light­weight wool)
• sun­glass­es (clear lens and polar­ized lens)
• back­pack with hydra­tion sys­tem (2–3L water capacity)
• cycling water bot­tle (with squirt lid)
• cam­era (phone, GoPro, point and shoot)
• ear warmer (toque or headband)

CHILL TIME:

• swimwear
• flip flops
• small camp tow­el (to use for swim­ming etc.)
• com­fort­able, casu­al clothes for relax­ing in (cot­ton attire, such as jeans, t‑shirt, hood­ed sweater will be wel­comed after a day in syn­thet­ics or wool)
• down-filled coat (maybe not if your des­ti­na­tion is Cos­ta Rica!)
• trail shoes or hik­ing boots
• back­pack (for day hikes)
• flash­light or headlamp

PERSONAL AND FIRST AID:

• toi­letries i.e. tooth­brush and tooth­paste, sham­poo and con­di­tion­er, soap, fem­i­nine hygiene prod­ucts etc.
• sun­screen (oil-free for sport)
• insect repel­lent (with Deet)
• anti-bac­te­r­i­al wipes
• anti-bac­te­r­i­al gel
• toi­let paper (depend­ing on the coun­try you are vis­it­ing, this could be hard to find!)
• chamois crème
• first-aid kit (ibupro­fen, band aids, Poly­sporin, tweezers)

RANDOM STUFF YOU DON’T REALIZE YOU NEED, WELL, UNTIL YOU NEED IT:

• elec­tri­cal tape (tape your bike tube or pump to your bike, with­out leav­ing a stickyresidue)
• duct tape (tape up holes in a bug net and/or every­thing else duct tape fixes!)
• solar pan­el bat­tery charg­er with USB adapter
• inter­na­tion­al trav­el pow­er adapter and con­vert­er (check out Lone­ly Plan­et for this des­ti­na­tion to find out more about cur­ren­cy and plugs)
• zip-lock bags
• gro­cery bags
• zip ties
• foam roller (trav­el size)
• ten­nis ball (for rolling out knots in your worked muscles)
• elas­tic bands

4. TUNE UP YOUR BIKE 

If you’ve decid­ed to take your own bike on your moun­tain bike hol­i­day (instead of rent­ing), make sure you vis­it your local bike shop  and  get a thor­ough tune up — or do it your­self if you’re mechan­i­cal­ly savvy!  Also ensure that you pack spare parts and tools  if required.  At the bare min­i­mum pack the following: 

• 2–4 spare tubes 
• mul­ti­tool  and tire lever
• front and rear brake pads 
• extra chain  (if yours is more than 6 months old)
• extra dérailleur hanger 
• any rare parts spe­cif­ic to your bike, that might be dif­fi­cult to find in the coun­try your visiting 

5. DO YOUR RESEARCH 

It’s always a great idea to do a lit­tle research on the coun­try you’re vis­it­ing to ensure  you under­stand the cul­ture and what to expect  when you arrive.  Lone­ly Plan­et is a great resource  for read­ing about cus­toms,  tra­di­tions,  cui­sine and adven­tures in for­eign lands.  Also, ask the moun­tain bike tour com­pa­ny that you’re trav­el­ing with  for local insights on the des­ti­na­tion.  You may think about arriv­ing ear­ly or extend­ing your trip to take in non-moun­tain bike relat­ed places and attrac­tions that aren’t includ­ed in the  guid­ed trip expe­ri­ence.  After all, if you’re going all the way to Peru — per­haps you should take a few extra days to explore the Amazon!

6. HAVE AN EMERGENCY CONTACT 

It’s impor­tant to  leave your trav­el plans, itin­er­ary, pass­port num­ber and  per­son­al details with  a friend or famiy mem­ber at home.  Leave a copy of your pass­port with them, and take a pho­to­copy of your pass­port  in your suit­case — in case it gets  lost or stolen. You may also like to reg­is­ter your trav­el plans with your embassy. If you’re a Cana­di­an trav­el­ing abroad you can reg­is­ter HERE.   In case there is a nat­ur­al dis­as­ter,  or oth­er type of emer­gency, the  gov­ern­ment will know where you are  and be able to pro­vide instruc­tions for  remain­ing safe. 

7. GET OUT AND RIDE! 

Prob­a­bly the most impor­tant thing to do when prepar­ing for a guid­ed moun­tain bike trip is to get out and ride as much as pos­si­ble! You don’t want to be show­ing up on Day 1 with  legs that haven’t  felt a ped­al stroke  in awhile!  While rid­ing your local trails, grad­u­al­ly start increas­ing your dis­tance and inten­si­ty  in the months pri­or to your adven­ture.  Also keep in mind that the week before  your trip, you’re going to want to drop the inten­si­ty of your bike rides and work-outs so  your body is  at 100%  for your trip. 

Ready to plan your mountain bike adventure?